The idea of a ‘grab bag’, featured as a search tool utility struck me as perhaps an inspirational and also enhanced networking concept…

I was answering the suggested question on FeaturEd’s Chatboard posed by TakingxOverxMe that asked;

What features would you like to see on Xanga?1/9/2008 7:47 PM TakingxOverxMe (chatboard)

I responded with the grab bag idea, that was sort of my brain & having a feel of what I’m doing on Xanga as a purely cerebral thing, I kind of stepped down from it and observed it processing, then figured the simplest way to say what something there could be like, and what results it would yield, how this is useful….

Another question came up, posed by raquelsdiary;

What do you look for in a blog?

What is the story behind your xanga name?1/11/2008 3:27 AM raquelsdiary (chatboard)

…and I saw fit to quote the ‘what features on Xanga’ question & field a response….. …..& a response is what I got 🙂

In the following exchanges, without it ever seeming complicated I managed to have completely conceptualised the grab bag feature in words, probably because it’s called ‘grab bag’, and described a thing that is easy to talk about in a well-informed reply – So naturally this has been a pleasure to do and for the Xanga community here is the rollout as far as my literary & MSPaint skills can take it…. the rest is up to the service provider…;

–Message Thread– [to raquelsdiary;]I answered a previous question on what features people would like to see on Xanga;

Well, I think Xangans are clever – it’s a weblog community and that’s self-expression and the more people use it, the more things should improve… This means I think Xangadotcommas are exceptionally clever because they provide the service – if there was one feature I would have them add, it’s a “grab bag” search tool. In keeping with content, or because a person wants a word that hasn’t already been used a lot – the grab bag would be a refined search that alphabetised words from the results and with links to the post. This would cancel ‘and’, ‘a’, ‘if’, ‘the’, ‘be’, could’, ‘when’ words and list nouns, pronouns, verbs, adjectives, adverbs… So, if I search All / Profiles / Weblogs / Featured or Suggested Qus / Image, Audio or Video captions for a word – it returns with all associated words from the results and links to the post[s] they are found in as well as with the grab bag of ‘context words’ associated [from the posts] with the search term …That would be an interesting feature to discover I think 🙂

And, if I was looking for something in a blog – s’ok I understand the way the question is meant, I would want this feature to go looking with.

So, In a more ‘specifically comprehending’ answer to your question – I’m looking for people who show the steps they take are towards improvement without necessarily making an example [of someone else], positivism, or just good narrative e.g. but equally not undermining the existing/present conscious entity to such a degree that people would be offended…. I hope there are people who blog and say what’s on their mind and how it is resolved by blogging – either through the act of journaling alone, or by making it public domain so others may make something of it.

For this reason I blog prolifically – it is not likely anyone would endure much scrutiny for a single paragraph of text or want to find something so obscure and have nothing else to comment on – for this reason, I serve plentiful amounts of blog and look forward to hearing from people.

& Short story – My username is my name 🙂

ATB Christian Sent 1/11/2008 11:33 AM by ChristianHilton

and to which raquelsdiary replied;

The grab bag idea is actually a really good idea. Seriously, I hate using overused words. Posted 1/11/2008 2:26 PM by raquelsdiary

which on the basis of the expressed use of ‘overused words’, I responded with;

Many thanks – your point is well received, I also think it lets a person find those words in the context of their search that make the result look immediately familiar to their own style of writing or vocabulary – and yes, a post on the same subject with overused words is ‘just another post/comment’….

Without wanting to consume any time you have set aside for your internet, may I ask how you would approach Xanga/other sites with a view to seeing this feature introduced….. – would you forward this response to your question, to Xanga and other users who could also see the benefit so they could [fwd &] add to ‘those in favour’…?

Thanks for taking the time to respond 🙂 cfn Christian Sent 1/11/2008 2:58 PM by ChristianHilton

….and to which raquelsdiary answered;

Well, if I were you, to introduce your idea, I’d blog about it first. Laying out exactly what the idea entails, and it’s uses. Also I’d give an example by setting up a scenario. (i.e. “Jane Doe is looking to make her blog more appealing by using a Grab Bag Search on Xanga. First she….etc.) I’d ask for readers to post their opinions about it. (you may even want to ask thetheologianscafe to send some of his readers your way). Send a link to your blog to a Xanga staff member and voila. Posted 1/12/2008 3:13 AM by raquelsdiary

…….and this readers, brings us here, the aforementioned place where I follow raquelsdiary’s advice and make it somehow real before it is actually happening;

Having familiarised yourself with the grab bag concept, I expect the clearest image I can provide to whittle any remaining unknown off, is actually an image – as this would just be a screenshot of a search tool & results page, I’m thinking I have gone one more striding bound towards it by just typing ‘search tool & results page’….

Anyhow, if you are still no wiser, and you have read this far and really need to see something, this is it, this is the idea I had…..:(see how I have put a search term in the image, ‘revelation’ – this portents an age of realisation!! 🙂

…So, in the above example, Jane Doe has searched for revelation – it is a term she will definitely use and knowing it pertains quite exclusively to biblical references before anything else, Jane uses the Grab Bag search to get the gen on how it is in current use – the refined results mean a unique essay can be published, it can take others into account and the time spent researching can be reduced considerably, or an allotted time (say all one day, or an afternoon of a weekend) can be spent going through results knowing from a grab bag summary that they are all containing something within the scope of her enquiry that may not have been expressed with just the term ‘revelation’ alone….